The 20 best new TV shows, according to critics

James Marsden and Evan Rachel Wood on HBO's "Westworld."
John P. Johnson/HBO
There are nearly 70 new TV shows in fall 2016. And many critics will say that there's a high degree of quality in that batch.

But that doesn't mean real people have the time to watch everything — no matter how good.

The problem now is we have to become really selective, really nitpicky. Some of the stuff that made it to our TV screens a year or two ago just doesn't hold up any longer compared to the competition.

Cable, the streaming companies, and even broadcast are taking viewers to bold new places — from "Atlanta" to "One Mississippi," "The Good Place," and "Westworld."

But where should you start?

Metacritic keeps track of a curated group of critics, assigns each review a number according to how positive or negative it was, and then creates a weighted average score for each show.

Here are the 20 most critically acclaimed TV shows of fall 2016 so far, according to Metacritic:

18. "Designated Survivor" (ABC)

Kiefer Sutherland plays Tom Kirkland, the secretary of housing and urban development, who becomes president after a deadly terrorist attack kills everyone else in the line of succession to the president.

16. "Quarry" (Cinemax)

Based on the best-selling books by Max Allan Collins, "Quarry" follows Marine Lloyd "Mac" Conway Jr. (Logan Marshall-Green) after returning home from his second tour in Vietnam. Shunned and demonized by a public that has turned against the war, he becomes a contract killer.

9. "The Durells in Corfu" (PBS)

Based on Gerard Durrell's books, "The Corfu Trilogy," this drama follows a widow who decided to leave Britain with her four kids for a fresh start on a Greek island.

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8. "The Good Place" (NBC)

Kristen Bell and William Jackson Harper on NBC comedy "The Good Place."
NBC

Metacritic score:
78

A young woman finds out she died and has gone to "the good place," but there's been a mistake. She knows she wasn't a very good person in life, but she'd rather not be found out and sent to the other place.